Priestly vocations rising ‘despite persecution’

(Aug.03,2010) Vocations to the Syro-Malabar priesthood in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh are on the rise, although the state has one of the country’s worst records of anti-Christian violence. Bishop Anthony Chirayath of Sagar said that when the diocese was set up in 1968 as an exarchate, there were only 600 Catholics in the region and three priests. Now there are 35 priests and 41 candidates to the priesthood despite “acts of persecution and discrimination,” he told the international charity Aid to the Church in Need - ACN. Bishop Chirayath told ACN, a charity that works on behalf of persecuted Christians, that in such circumstances “it took courage for young people to come forward to serve the Church.”
Since he became bishop four years ago, he said, a minor seminary has been established in Bararu, near his home. There are currently 25 students there. ACN is supporting them by donating £15,000 to build a chapel that can hold a congregation of 60. “A place of prayer is very important – it is central to liturgical formation,” the bishop said.
Madhya Pradesh is one of five states in India to have enacted anti-conversion laws and ACN quoted Ajay Maken, the Home Affairs Minister, as saying it had the country’s second-highest number of religious-related incidents last year.